Patient 35234
by Sinical-Sarchasm
Summary: "Half of St. Mungo's is mad at the start, and the deaf white walls, staring unremittingly, are enough to madden the other half..." A strange little vignette about St. Mungo's...sort of angsty but not really. Just r/r.


A.N.: *shakes head* Whenever you think it's all over you realize that it's not. In this case, the fanfic writing. I haven't written anything in ages, but recently (i.e., two days ago) I finished rereading all of the books and got this uncontrollable urge to just write one more fanfic...just start writing again...and this was the product. *sighs* My poor parents. They were so thrilled that I was getting out of that computer Harry Potter nonsense and beginning to see that there really is a real world out there. Oh well...anyway, a little "slice of life" in St. Mungo's. PLEASE do review -- I really want to know what you think.

Disclaimer: Your lawyer has many better things to do with has life than waste his time suing a poor little fanfic author. If he hasn't got anything better to do with his life, he really ought to find something. Anything. Take up knitting. Become a plumber. Rescue stray animals. Buy Dobby and Dumbledore some socks.

Half of St. Mungo's is mad at the start, and the deaf white walls, staring unremittingly, are enough to madden the other half, rumor tells. Mungo's is made, the clean white Ministry doctors boast, solely for the care for the dying and hopeless cases, but they don't mention how the one daily routine is not a temperature check, or therapy, or a nice cool cup of juice, but the sweep to clear away all those who had died the day before and yell at the other doctors, all the while unsure what exactly this _is_ he's saying to her, or she's saying to him, and too tired to care.

Of course, occasionally a little girl with an obscure ailment will enter the doors, or a plaintive old woman will tell in a bird-like voice that she's not sure just what's wrong, but it's too creaky and there's got to be something wrong, hasn't there? And we smile at Life because we're too far separated from it, and cry when it goes away, squashed by all of the Emptiness and Death.

Yes, we need more plaintive women and crying children, but they don't come in large numbers here and they never last. Just yesterday we had a woman, blonde hair all in her face and tears making her look like a drowned bird, and the doctors were murmuring to each other, "Attempted suicide...send her somewhere else...no, no, she'll be fine..."

I miss the drowning bird who almost shared this room, because she had a fire about her, an awareness of life that evades the rest of us.

Of course, that's why she's not here.

The doctor was talking to that woman's husband..."I know she attempted suicide...yes, quite aware...but this is for the utterly hopeless...empty shells, you know..." While other doctors nodded, not caring what they were nodding to.

Well, they're half right about me. I'm empty as far as the rest of the world is concerned, and isn't that all that matters? It's not as if it could matter if I could hear and think if I can't reply, if I can't express myself at all. I've gotten used to it.

It's lonely, lonely, but we are powerless...we are hopeless...

A boy is being taken in and he hasn't got the life I'm craving. Maybe he'll stay longer.

"Neville Longbottom..." a doctor is saying in a blurred tone that at first I can't quite understand.

"Most curious case..." and I think perhaps one of the doctors is raising his eyes above the cup of coffee at these words, maybe excited by the prospect of research that can get him away from the hellish despair in here, "...yes, very curious...you know, he is the only man who has ever spoken anything, ever been anything, after receiving a Kiss...hmm?...I don't know why Voldemort...doesn't matter...oh, well what he said...not important...honestly...what does it...oh but he said, 'Mommy. Daddy. Nice to meet you at last,' like I said, no importance...yes, yes..."

The words, bearing down on me...my son, my son...the Dementor's Kiss...Neville...he loved me, he loved the empty shell I am at last, and I can't take all this love, it's too much at once...Neville, I try to gasp out, try to release some of all this...but the hope and understanding is more than I can stand...a white coat flashes at me, glimmers as it catches some artificial light and the doctor shouts to his colleague the last words I ever hear: "Dr. Smith, a death in room 8B...Patient 35234, Frank Longbottom," in a beautifully sterile voice.


End file.
